


Of Carnivals and Compromise

by RandomSlasher (Randomslasher)



Category: Sanders Sides, Thomas Sanders, Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, M/M, Mentions of Sex, cursing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-03
Updated: 2017-07-03
Packaged: 2018-11-22 16:55:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11384421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Randomslasher/pseuds/RandomSlasher
Summary: Prince and Anxiety finally go on a first date. Social awkwardness, a little bit of self-loathing, and a whole lot of self-doubt ensue, but it's nothing a good talk and a Disney marathon can't cure.Mostly fluff with a little bit of angst on the side.





	Of Carnivals and Compromise

**Author's Note:**

> Mentions of an OC who is completely fictional. Based on this Tumblr prompt from akreliadeklavesht:
> 
>  
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> _Could you maybe write something about prince and anxiety on their first attempt at going on a date together after establishing that they like each other? I love the idea of them ending up watching Disney at the end of a confusing date night._
> 
>  
> 
> Big thanks to Thuri for the beta and the quote about bravery!

*  
This wasn't going to work. 

Anxiety sat huddled in on himself, the bright, cheerful sounds of the carnival clanging around him, leaving his ears buzzing and his body on a tripwire. This might've been a pleasant memory for Roman, but for Anxiety, this night had been hellish; between worrying about what kinds of diseases Thomas might pick up at the filthy bathrooms and imagining all the ways the rickety rides could send him hurdling to a gruesome death, it was not a time or a place he'd wanted to revisit. 

He was certain Prince didn't remember how awful the evening had been for him--it had taken place almost three years ago, and all of Anxiety's protests about the evening had been loudly overridden by Morality's sense of nostalgia and Princey's sense of adventure. Logic had muttered a few half-hearted protests about wasting time, but after that he'd disappeared into his room, content to let the night pass without his interference while Anxiety spouted warnings that went mostly unheeded. 

So why this night? Why, of all the memories in the mindscape they could have visited for their first date, would Princey have chosen the night of the stupid carnival? 

_Because he had fun here. Because he thought you did, too. Because he didn't even remember how miserable this place made you, nor did he pause to think about the fact that you might not enjoy revisiting it. Which is why this is not going to work. We're different. We're too different. We have absolutely nothing in common and he's going to realize it any moment and that'll be it. He'll go back to hating me and I'll..._

"Funnel cake!" 

Anxiety's head snapped up. Roman had returned, a broad smile on his stupidly gorgeous face, brandishing two paper plates laden with sugar-dusted deep fried dough. 

"Great," Anxiety tried on a smile and found it a little too tight on his face. 

Roman noticed, and his smile turned to one of confusion. "Anx? What's wrong? I thought you liked funnel cake?" 

"It's--yeah, it's fine," Anxiety said, cramming back his first response. Because it was Morality and Thomas who liked the heartstoppingly unhealthy confection, not him, but why should Princey remember that? The fanciful side lived in the moment. Not like Anxiety, who obsessed endlessly over each and every detail of every day in his search for What Went Wrong. 

This was _so_ not going to work. 

"Oh." Roman looked at the plates, then shrugged sheepishly at him. "I could've sworn--well, no matter." He set the plates aside on the picnic table. He thought for a moment, then brightened again. "Well, what would you prefer instead? They had popcorn, and corn dogs, and those big pretzels--" 

A loud scream from the nearby roller coaster interrupted him, and Anxiety jerked, adrenaline flooding into his system and making his heart slam against the inside of his chest. The scream was immediately followed by peals of delighted laughter, and Anxiety had to swallow against the bile that was trying to crawl up his throat. "I'm--I'm not really hungry," he managed. 

Roman seemed not to hear him; he'd turned toward the ride and now wore an indulgent smile, looking slightly starry eyed. "Remember that ride?" he dreamily, sinking down to sit across the table from Anxiety.

"Yeah." He did. Every harrowing second of it. Every creak of the track, every rumble, every lurch of Thomas's body against the safety bar or the sides of the car were burned into Anxiety's memory. 

"That boy Thomas liked," Roman rested his chin on the heel of his hand. "What was his name?" 

"Scott." 

"Yes. Scott. He was there. He sat right next to Thomas. Every time the car turned they ended up pressed together. Remember that? Thomas was ecstatic." 

"Uh huh." And Anxiety had been cataloging Scott's every reaction. Did he notice how nervous Thomas had been to get onto the ride? Did he realize what a coward Anxiety made him? What if he was sweating? What if he had bad breath from the onion rings? Why on earth had he eaten onion rings anyway? It was a date, sort of. You didn't eat onion rings on a date. Even a sort-of one. 

"That was a great night," Roman concluded with a happy sigh, picking up a piece of funnel cake and twirling it between his fingers. Anxiety thought about telling him he was spraying powdered sugar all over his sleeve, then decided not to. 

"If you say so." 

Roman looked back at him then, brows furrowed. "You didn't enjoy it?" 

_Here it comes._ "I...no, it was...it was fine." 

Roman sat back and arched a brow at him. "Now, Anxiety," he said, voice bordering on lecture and making him sound unnervingly like Patton. "You know the foundation of a strong relationship is openness and honesty. We need to tell each other the truth." 

Anxiety snorted in spite of himself. Was he serious? "Are you serious?" 

"Why, of course! Logic even loaned me a book about it."

"You read a book?" 

"I read, thank you very much. Where do you think Thomas gets his best ideas?" 

"But a book about relationships?" Anxiety was smirking now, the familiar banter calming him somewhat. "A dry, boring, _non-fiction--"_

"Okay, okay, I didn't read it," Prince cut him off with a dismissive wave. "But I read the back. And the first thing it said was openness and _honesty_ , and don't think I don't see what you're doing there." 

"What I'm doing?" 

"You're deflecting." The look he leveled at Anxiety was surprisingly sharp. "You're directing the conversation away from you by teasing me." 

"Who said I'm teasing?" But Anxiety sighed, when Princey merely arched an eyebrow. "Okay, fine. Maybe I'm deflecting a little." 

"Why?" 

"Because it's our first date. Because you spent hours searching Thomas's memories for something you thought I'd like, and you picked the carnival." 

"So you _didn't_ like the carnival." Princey didn't sound as upset as Anxiety had feared he would. Instead, he nodded thoughtfully. "May I ask why not?" 

"So now I have to justify myself to you?" Anxiety bristled. 

"Not at all," the prince assured him. "I simply want to learn more about you, and I believe knowing why you disliked a night the rest of us enjoyed would offer me some insight." 

_Yeah. Into why this whole stupid dating thing is a bad idea._ Anxiety slumped, his annoyance fleeing as quickly as it had come, leaving defeat in its wake. "Okay. You really want to know why I hated this night?" 

"Please." 

"Because I hate most nights. You spent ages looking for a memory I'd enjoy, but it was a needle in a fucking haystack, because there _aren't_ that many. I'm _fear_ , Princey, don't you get that?" 

"But...but what could there be to fear at a carnival?" 

Anxiety sat back and laughed, and it was a grating, mirthless sound even to him. "You really don't know me at _all_ ," he said. 

"Yes, so you've said," Princey said, sounding frustrated. "Can we concede that point and meet in the middle? I'm _trying_ to know you, Anxiety, but you don't make it easy, you know?" 

"Why should I? Until you decided you wanted into my pants, you never even bothered to _try_." The words were out before he could stop them. Anxiety closed his eyes, hunching his shoulders. "Look, this...this is a really bad idea. Maybe...maybe we should just forget this whole...dating thing. We can just...just be a hook-up." That would be good, right? Princey would still get what he wanted, and Anxiety wouldn't have to keep waiting for him to decide he'd made a huge mistake. 

Win fucking win. 

Prince was silent for so long that Anxiety began to think he'd left. When he finally dared to peek, however, the royal was still there, staring at him with a carefully neutral expression. 

"Is that really what you think I want? Just sex?" he said, voice soft. 

"Um...yes?" Anxiety was confused. What else was there? Why else would anyone date _him?_

"If that were the case, why wouldn't I date Patton or Logan? We share the same physical characteristics. Why would I chose you?" 

"You sound like Logic," Anxiety muttered. 

"Answer the question." Prince was smiling now, but there was a gentleness to it that hurt him to look at. 

"I don't know. You're Princey. You like things to be stupidly challenging?" 

"What challenge? You're offering to jump right into bed with me to--I don't know, save me from having to spend real time with you? Isn't that right? How is that a challenge?" 

"You didn't _know_ I'd do that," Anxiety hedged. 

"But now I do. So why am I still here?" 

"That's a _very_ good question," Anxiety growled, scowling at Prince. Prince, with his stupid shining hair and kind eyes and broad shoulders. "Why _are_ you still here? I'm the villain, remember? The bad guy. I hated the carnival--everyone else loved it, but I _hated_ it because I was terrified. Every time we got on one of those stupid rides I was certain we were about to die. When we rode through the tunnel of love I figured we would either be murdered by a psychopath, or worse, that Scott would try to kiss us while we had onion breath. The place was loud, and it smelled, and there were people _everywhere,_ and what if we did something stupid and they all saw us? What if they laughed? What if someone got it on their phone and put it on youtube and it went viral? We'd be ruined. _Thomas_ would be ruined. And you expected me to have _fun_ ?"

Prince, damn him, had never stopped smiling. If anything, the smile had gotten gentler as Anxiety ranted, and now that he'd fallen silent, Prince reached across the table and laid a hand over Anxiety's, which were clenched together a pair of white-knuckled fists. 

"I'm really proud of you," he said softly, and there was something like awe in his eyes.

Anxiety hated himself for the curl of happiness in his chest. There was no way Prince could mean that. "What do you mean?" 

"That couldn't have been easy, but you did it." 

"Did what? Yelled at you?" His eyes were burning. Why were his eyes burning? "That _was_ easy. I do that all the time." 

"Well, yes, though you aren't usually revealing something so personal when you do," Princey conceded, leaning back a little and regarding him fondly. "But no. That's not what I meant. I meant you did it--the carnival. You went. You let Thomas go, even as afraid as you were." 

"I kind of had to, didn't I? You and Patton pretty much forced me to." 

"You know that's not true, and so do I," Prince said. "If you really wanted to, you could keep Thomas locked up in his room forever. You have more power than the rest of us combined, but you let us have our say. Most of the time, at least." He tilted his head and regarded Anxiety thoughtfully. "You know, you're really very brave." 

Anxiety--who had, for a brief shining moment, believed Prince might actually be complimenting him--scowled and looked away, hurt. "Very funny," he muttered. 

"No, you are." Prince tapped his hands with his fingertips to get his attention, and when Anxiety glanced back Prince's expression was very serious. 

Anxiety squirmed, then said, "How? I'm afraid all the time. I'm afraid of _everything."_

"But you still take action," Prince said. "You _face_ your fears. Daily." 

"But my fears are ridiculous. You guys remind me of that all the time." 

"Maybe to us they seem irrational," Prince allowed. "But to you they're very real. And you still act. That's what's truly incredible about you. Bravery isn't the absence of fear. It's acting in spite of it." He smiled. "You're very brave, Anxiety. Braver than any of the rest of us--even me." 

Dammit, he was not going to cry. He wasn't. He turned his head to the side and sniffled as surreptitiously as he could. "The hay. From the pony ride. It's bugging me," he muttered, offering an explanation Prince hadn't asked for. 

"Very well. Let's go somewhere else, then." But he didn't move right away, giving Anxiety a few moments to get a hold of himself. 

"Where?" he said finally, when he was certain he could speak without his voice cracking. "I told you, I don't like very many of Thomas's memories." 

Prince simply smiled. "Then I suppose we'll have to make some of our own." 

* 

When Anxiety woke up, it wasn't the startled, sudden-alertness that typically accompanied his return to consciousness. Instead, it was slow and gradual. Comfortable. And for the first time in a long time--maybe forever--he realized he felt safe. 

His pillow shifted a little bit beneath him, and he realized the gentle rumbling above him was the sound of Roman's light snoring. For a moment, confusion fogged his thinking, but then he opened his eyes and saw the menu sequence for Finding Nemo on the TV, and the events of the previous evening returned. 

He smiled, the expression finding its way uncertainly onto his face, and turned his head a little, hiding his face against the royal's shoulder. Prince grunted and shifted some, making room for him and draping his arm over Anxiety's shoulder. Then he settled again, and the snoring resumed. 

Okay. So maybe this was weird. Maybe Roman was everything he was not: outgoing and charming and brave (no matter what the royal told him, Anxiety couldn't believe it of himself). And maybe this didn't make much sense. 

But Roman had listened. That was what counted. When it came down to it, he was ready to throw out every idea he had about the perfect first date (and as the romantic of the group, he'd had plenty) and do what made Anxiety happy. 

And sure, maybe a Disney marathon wasn't the most conventional of first date choices. But...

But it worked. It had worked, so maybe they could, too. 

Anxiety sighed, curling in a little closer and wrapping a daring arm around Princey's chest. Then he closed his eyes and let himself drift back to sleep. 

*

Thanks for reading!


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